A fter Cole falls asleep, I ponder the question of first sires. What makes most Vampires decide to turn that first someone? I know for CK and the other Initial Vampires, it was all about creating a race, but what about everyone else? If Devon chooses to sire this girl, I will be devastated. As much as I don’t like to admit it, I am glad that he has never sired. I love having him all to myself. If he went off now and did it just to spite me, it would be a mistake. My own story is heartbreaking, and I don’t like to think about it too often. But now, my mind wanders back to that day that I first turned someone.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SEVEN
Duchy of Saxony – 1121 – Aefre
A fter I left Constantine, and I changed my form to that of the blue-eyed, dark-haired girl, I decided to keep it. I knew that if he came looking for me, he would never find me. He would be looking for the green-eyed, light-haired girl that he met.
She no longer existed.
I changed my name in the beginning but as I made my way into the Duchy of Saxony, I changed it back. It was t
he birthplace of my ancestors and my name reflected that lineage, after all.
I found work with a traveling healer. I was so used to having to want for nothing with Constantine’s servants and Feeders, his wealth and power, I struggled on my own. I needed work, but I had no skills to speak of. The healer took me on as I was able and strong, and the sight of blood and gore didn’t bother me. In fact, it was quite the opposite, obviously. But more than that, I wasn’t interested in the healing of the humans. I was interested to see the damage inside. To see how they hurt and didn’t heal. It had been a long time since I’d been a human, and I had forgotten what it was like to hurt. Physically, at least.
I thought Galena was a witch of some kind. I thought that was why she travelled from village to village, never staying in one place long enough for anyone to get suspicious as to her successful healing rate.
One day, we came upon a small village in the north of the Duchy, where we were offered shelter and food in exchange for her services. That was when I met Evoric. A young man, with the bluest eyes and the darkest hair. He was sweet, caring, and funny. And dying.
He had phthisis. He was dying with a cough so cruel it brought tears to my eyes because I liked him. He made me laugh when he was lucid, and we talked about where I had been with Galena and the things I had seen. He told me about his family as I soothed him when he was in pain. He knew his end was near, but he wasn’t afraid. His strength of character was one of the things I liked most about him. He made me forget about my sire. My sire that I missed more than anything. Every day, I wanted to return to Castellum Aquapontanus, but then I remembered him with that woman, her fangs in his neck, and I hated him all over again. But I loved him still, and it hurt not to be around him. To have him hold me and kiss me, to smile that smile at me that I loved so much. No, I wouldn’t go back. He had hurt me too much.
“Do not be sad, lovely Aefre,” Evoric said to me as I drifted off into my thoughts of Constantine.
“I am sad. I am sad for you. I cannot lose you,” I said as I took his hand. I came to sit with him, every day.
Galena had left to attend the next village, saying she would return for me. I had refused to go as I did not want to leave Evoric. He had no one. No one would sit with him for fear of contracting his disease and it made me sad.
“Don’t be sad for me, you are too pretty to be sad. That face was made to smile,” he said weakly. I felt the tears prick my eyes. This wasn’t my face. Not my real one. I wanted to show him the real me and tell him what I was. Constantine always said that we should never reveal our true selves to others, not unless they were already aware of us and accepting. I never really understood that, because how could someone be aware of us, if we never got to show them?
“I will smile when you are well,” I said to him.
He shook his head. “No, Aefre. I will not be well again.” I held his hand tightly as he coughed viciously, holding a cloth to his mouth to catch the blood. He fell into a fitful sleep then and I stayed with him, stroking his hair and curling myself around him to comfort him.
Galena returned the next morning. “He isn’t going to make it until sunset,” she whispered to me.
I shook my head. “No, there has to be something you can do. I know what you are. Help him.”
“I cannot help him, my child. But you can. I, too, know what you are.”
“I don’t understand,” I said, fearful.
“I know you are a Vampire, Aefre. If you want your friend to live, you can help him,” she insisted.
“How? How can I help him?”
“By making him into one of your kind,” she said impatiently.
“I don’t know how to do that,” I said honestly, as I had never done that before.
“How did your own sire turn you?”
“I was run through with a spear and then I woke up in Normandy as a Vampire. I don’t know,” I said, wringing my hands.
“You must know,” she said. “What did your sire tell you?”
“He mentioned something about giving me his blood, but he has never instructed me how to do it.”
“You don’t need instruction, my child. Just feed from him and then give him your blood,” she said. “It won’t make any difference now if you do it wrong,” she added quietly. “He won’t last the day as he is.”